Josh greeted her with “Where’s Winky? Is the storm over?”
“I’m tired of sitting in the bathtub,” Caroline whined. “Can we go sit in the den?”
“Shush, y’all,” Erin said. “Mama will tell us when we can move.”
“I wish we’d brought pillows to sit on,” Josh said. “My butt’s gone to sleep.”
“Where’s Winky?” Erin asked. “Did you find him?”
“I found him. He’s okay, but he won’t come to me. Now, y’all hush for a minute while I check the weather.”
Though the circulating winds were fast and fierce, the storm system itself was moving slowly, only a couple of miles per hour. The calmer weather inside the eye of the storm might only last a couple of hours, so if they were going to get out, they should do it now. “Y’all stay here. I’ll be back in a minute. I’m gonna go check to see if the car is okay.”
The door from the house into the garage stuck when she tried to open it, but she wrestled with it until it popped open. The garage and the car appeared to be untouched, though the metal garage door was blown outward and flapped like a sail in the wind.
It would bash against the hood of the car if Heather tried to back the car out past it. Would it be worth the risk? She stepped toward the opening and scanned the area with the flashlight’s beam. The barn was gone, swept away as if it had never existed. Only a raw patch of red dirt remained. And the driveway… “Well, shit.”
The driveway was blocked by an enormous fallen tree.
***
The power had gone out hours ago, but the gas-powered generator hummed on the patio at Reva’s, keeping the lights, the fridge, and the television going. They’d lost satellite reception even before the power went out, but they had a good-sized stack of DVDs to watch—more than enough to get them through the storm. They followed the storm on their phones’ weather apps. The eye wall had just passed, so they were almost halfway through.
Adrian’s phone buzzed. When he saw it was Heather calling, he jumped up from the couch, dumping the dog in his lap onto the floor. “Sorry, bud.” Everybody, humans and animals, stared at him. “It’s Heather.” He looked at Reva. “Where can I…?”
She pointed to a closed door at the end of a short hallway. “My bedroom’s quiet.”
Adrian answered the call as soon as he stepped into the hallway, expecting to hear Heather’s voice. Instead, it was Josh. “Ade?” His voice trembled with fear. “Can you come help us?”
Adrenaline flooded Adrian’s body. He leaned against the wall. “What’s happened? Is your mom okay?”
“She’s gone out to see if the car is okay. But Winky won’t come to her.”
That made no sense. What could the car and the cat possibly have to do with each other? “Josh, let me talk to Erin, please.”
When Erin answered, Adrian asked her to tell him what was going on.
“I peeked out the bathroom door when Mom left to check on the car,” Erin confessed. “Part of the roof is gone, and there’s a big tree in the hallway. It was on fire at first, but the rain put the fire out. But Winky wouldn’t—”
“Where are y’all?” Adrian cut her off. “Where in the house, I mean.”
“We’re downstairs, in Mom’s bathroom. She made us sit in the bathtub with a mattress over our heads.”
“Good.” Thank God. If he was lucky, he’d have two hours to get them out of there before they were hit with the back side of the storm. “When she gets back from checking the car, tell her that I am on my way and that she is to get in that bathtub with the rest of you and wait for me to get there. I don’t want any of you to leave that bathroom under any circumstances. Do you hear me?”
“Yes, sir.”
“I will be there as soon as I can.”
“But what about Winky?”
“I will deal with the cat. Y’all stay put, and make your mama stay put too.”
“Yes, sir.”
“Promise me.”
“I promise.”
“I’m on my way.”
When Adrian got back to the living room, none of the humans were there. Reva hurried in from the kitchen and handed him a plastic grocery bag. “Flashlights, first aid kit, bottled water.”
Abby came from the laundry room with another bag. “It’s full of towels in case y’all get wet.” She shrugged. “I didn’t know what else you might need.”
“Cat crate,” Reva reminded her. “They’ll need one for Winky.”
Abby went back for the crate, and Quinn opened the sliding glass door by the patio. “I’ve got the chainsaw and an ax in the back of the truck. Let’s go.”
“Be careful.” Abby came back with the crate. She kissed Quinn and hugged Adrian. “Come back safe.”
“Watch for downed power lines,” Reva yelled at them as they ran to the truck. “And don’t drive through standing water.”
“Hurry back,” Abby yelled.
“Keep us posted,” Reva added. “We’ll be worried until y’all get back safe.”
“Thanks for driving,” Adrian told Quinn as the truck peeled out of the driveway. He knew if he’d been driving, he might have taken risks that Quinn wouldn’t. “But we only have a couple of hours before the back side of the storm hits us. Can’t you go any faster?”
“I’m going fast enough.” The windshield wipers cut through the slashing rain; the headlights illuminated vegetation bowing and swaying along the sides of the road. “My speed isn’t as much as factor as…” Quinn tapped the brakes, then eased to a stop in front of an uprooted pine tree. “Fallen trees blocking the road.”
“Dammit to hell.” Adrian jumped out of the truck and grabbed the chainsaw. He cut the tree’s trunk into manageable-sized pieces, then he and Quinn moved the logs off the pavement, clearing a space just wide enough for the truck to pass.
They made it another mile before another tree blocked the road and a mile after that before they had to turn around and find a new route to avoid a downed power line.
“Fuck me,” Adrian cursed when they had to stop for the umpteenth time. “This had better be the last tree we have to move off the road. I feel like we’ve cut through a forest of trees already.”
“We’ll get there,” Quinn said. “And getting back will be easier unless more trees fall across the roads we’ve already cleared.”
When Quinn’s truck finally pulled into Heather’s driveway—which was blocked by another huge tree—Adrian jumped out of the truck and climbed over the tree before the truck had fully stopped.
The big showcase oak in Heather’s front yard had uprooted and crashed through the roof, crushing the front wall of the house. Thank God the kids hadn’t been in their bedrooms at the time. The garage door hung like a limp sheet on a clothesline, flapping weakly in the slightly calmer wind of the storm’s wide eye. Adrian went around back and entered the house through the back-porch door into the den. “Jesus.” The whole place was a disaster. The house Heather was so proud of was a total write-off.
He went through the master bedroom and yanked open the bathroom door. Jasper barked, and Heather leaped up and ran into his arms, hugging him fiercely. “What are you doing here?”
“Josh called me.”
“I know. The kids told me. But still… Are you crazy? Don’t you know it’s dangerous for you to be out driving in the middle of a hurricane?”
“I would drive anywhere, anytime, to get to y’all.” He tucked a curl behind her ear. “You should know that.”
“I do know that.” She touched the side of his face. “I’ve never doubted it.” But she didn’t say that it made any difference. She didn’t say that she’d made a mistake and wanted him back. But…she also didn’t stop hugging him. He decided to take that as a good sign.
Caroline and Josh scrambled over the edge of the bathtub and rushed across the small room to hug Adrian�
��s legs. “We were so scared,” Caroline said, her thin arms squeezing tight.
Adrian put a hand on Caroline’s soft hair. “Everything is gonna be okay now.”
“Thank you for coming to get us,” Heather whispered. She cupped his face in her palms and stared into his eyes for a long second, then gently kissed his cheek.
“Didn’t Erin tell you to get in the bathtub with the kids?” he whispered so the kids wouldn’t hear the fear in his voice. “What if the ceiling fell?”
“I would have gotten in that bathtub if my butt wasn’t so wide.” She smiled with just the hint of a tease. “I guess I’ll have to lose weight before the next storm.”
He took a chance and slid a hand down to lightly cup her very fine ass. “Maybe we’ll have to make sure your next house has a bigger bathtub in the master suite.”
“Ew,” Erin said in disgust from behind them. “Get a room.”
“We’re about to,” he promised. “Come here.” He gathered Erin into his embrace, too, and with his arms around all four members of the family he had come to love, he closed his eyes and said a quick prayer of thanks for their safety. He knew that there was still a lot to be worked out between him and Heather, but that kiss gave him a little bit of hope that it could be done.
“Guess what time it is?” Josh said randomly.
“I don’t know,” Adrian answered. “What time is it?”
“Eleven fifty-five.” Josh held up Heather’s phone to show the time on the screen. “You got here just in time.”
“Did you have to hack through a forest to get here?” Caroline asked with a hint of awe in her voice.
“Matter of fact, I did,” he answered. Then he whispered in Heather’s ear, “What are they going on about?”
Quinn stepped around the corner with a flashlight. “Dude. Why do you have glitter all over your face?”
“It’s because he’s Mommy’s handsome prince,” Caroline answered.
***
Heather tucked all three of her kids into the queen-sized bed in Reva’s guest room. Jasper was curled up at the foot of the bed, and miraculously, for once, Winky didn’t seem to mind sleeping on the same bed as the dog. Winky was relaxing on top of Erin. “I’m sorry y’all will be sleeping a little closer than you’re used to.”
“That’s okay,” Erin said, petting Winky, whose loud purr competed with the roar of the torrential rain pelting the metal roof. “We’re gonna want to sleep close for a while, I think.”
“That was a scary storm,” Caroline said. “I hope nothing like that happens ever again.”
“I hope so too,” Heather answered, but she realized that she couldn’t promise safety, not to her kids, and not to herself either. Especially when the second half of the storm was still roaring outside Reva’s house. “But I will be close by, in the living room, watching the weather. And I’ll take care of you if anything happens.”
“Adrian too, right?” Caroline asked. “He’ll take care of us.”
Josh pulled at the sleeve of Heather’s T-shirt. “I saw you kissing Ade. Are y’all gonna get married?”
“Now that he’s your handsome prince,” Erin added with a happy smirk.
“I don’t know.” Heather regretted how badly she’d blown it with Adrian, and she could only hope he’d give her another chance. “Maybe one of these days, a long time from now.” She smoothed down her son’s hair, where a cowlick kicked up a rooster tail along his hairline. “If we did, would that be okay with you?”
“Yeah!” Josh yelled. Then he moderated his volume a bit. “Yeah.”
“What about you, Caroline? What would you think about that?”
Caroline nodded, a solemn expression on her face. “He is your handsome prince, so I think you have to.” She turned her head on the pillow to look at Erin. “Isn’t that the rule? I mean, he did pass the test on time.”
Erin grinned. “Maybe we have to let Adrian and Mama figure it out for themselves.”
Heather gave kisses to each of the kids. “That’s a good idea.” She petted Winky and Jasper, then turned out the bedroom light. “We’ll be right outside the door if you need us.”
Leaving the bedroom door open a crack, Heather went back to Reva’s cozy living room, where Reva was dozing in the recliner with Georgia while Abby and Quinn cuddled on the couch with Wolf. Adrian moved Jack, the three-legged puppy, fully into his lap, then patted the empty place beside him on the love seat. Heather sat with a sigh, finally allowing herself to relax fully. Adrian reached out casually and pulled her close, snuggled against his side. She put her head on his chest, and he maneuvered her feet with his until they were entwined on the same ottoman.
“Adrian—” she started to say something to clear the air between them.
“Shhh,” he said. “We’ll talk later.”
She let him shush her. They weren’t the only ones in the room, and she hadn’t known what to say anyway. Maybe all this closeness was premature. Maybe they were both too emotionally worn out to be thinking clearly, but for now, at least, this felt right. Jack must have thought so too, because he stretched out across both their laps with a groan of contentment.
Adrian kissed the top of Heather’s head. “Is your crew all tucked in?”
She petted the dog’s softly folded ears. “All safe and sound, thanks to you.”
“Thanks to you,” he corrected. “You were very brave, and very smart to put that mattress over them. You did everything right.”
“I guess maybe I did. But I’m so glad you rescued us before the back half of the storm went through. I don’t think that bathroom ceiling will hold up for long in all this wind and rain.”
“Is the house as bad as Quinn said?” Abby asked quietly. “I mean, is it…gone?”
“Pretty much,” Heather answered. “At least too damaged to repair. The stuff we brought with us—the two laundry baskets full of clothes and the shoes that were in the mudroom—may be all we can salvage.”
“We’ll know more in the morning,” Adrian said. “As soon as the rain stops, we’ll go see what’s what.”
“It’s all just stuff,” Heather said, though the loss of all the family photographs stung. “None of it really matters, though, because we’re all safe. Thanks to Adrian and Quinn.”
“It was nothing,” Quinn said in a joking tone. “We save the world all the time, don’t we, Ade?”
“Yeah,” Adrian agreed quietly. “But we save the ones we love first, if we can.”
Heather felt a tight knot inside her heart unravel at his words. We save the ones we love…if we can.
But what if we can’t save the ones we love?
Does that mean we don’t ever deserve to love again?
Heather wondered for the first time whether her reluctance to allow Adrian into her life was about more than the fear of her and the kids losing him and of having to go through that pain all over again. Was she also denying herself another chance at love because she thought she didn’t deserve it?
Maybe she wasn’t as weak and helpless as she’d thought. Maybe she did have the strength to save the ones she loved, at least some of the time.
And maybe she did deserve to love again.
The wind buffeted the house, making the siding clack. “Listen to that,” Abby said.
The two couples sat through the rest of the storm, quietly talking while Reva snoozed. When the rain stopped and the wind died down, Quinn walked over to the wall of windows that faced the pool and peered out. “We’re through the worst of it.” He held a hand out to Abby. “You ready to go to bed?”
“Yeah, sure.” Abby stretched and yawned, and Wolf hopped down off the couch, his fluffy tail swaying. “Let’s go.”
Quinn touched Reva’s shoulder. “Storm’s passed. We’re going to bed.”
Georgia hopped down from the recliner and waited with tail-wagg
ing anticipation for Reva to go to bed. Jack did the same. “Doggies have spoken.” She collapsed the footrest and stood. “Clean bedding for that pullout bed is stored in the ottoman y’all have your feet on. Sleep well, everyone.” She moved off toward her bedroom with the two dogs behind her. “See y’all in the morning.”
When everyone had left, Adrian tipped Heather’s chin up and gave her a searching look. “I’ll sleep in the recliner if that’s what you want. But I would much prefer to sleep with my arms around you.”
She took his face in her hands and kissed him. “I love you.” She pulled back just enough to stare into his eyes. “And I’m sorry for pushing you away when I got scared.” And the minute she admitted to being scared, she got even more scared, too scared to look into his eyes any longer.
She snuggled down into his embrace, put her head on his chest, and lowered her voice to a whisper. “I know it doesn’t make much sense, but in some convoluted dark alley of my mind, I thought that pushing you back to the friend zone you would keep you safe. I know it sounds crazy. Probably because it is.” She let out a little huff of laughter. “I might have to admit that I’m crazy.”
He hugged her so hard that she could feel his arms tremble. “I’m not going to let you get away from me after this,” he said in a whisper. “You scared me so bad, I’m not gonna let you out of my sight for a long time.”
***
The next day, the two couples piled into Quinn’s truck, prepared to work most of the day at Heather’s place and salvage what they could. The truck bed was loaded with the chainsaw and a few other implements of destruction, and the flatbed trailer was hooked up to the bumper hitch. “Y’all be careful,” Reva said. “Make sure the power’s off before you start sawing stuff.”
“We will,” Quinn promised with a smile and a wave. “Not stupid,” he added more quietly when Reva turned away to pick up a stack of plastic bins she’d gathered in case they found anything in the rubble of Heather’s house that was worth saving.
“I heard that,” Reva said to Quinn through the truck’s open back door. She set the bins on the seat next to Heather. “The kids and I will hold down the fort here. Y’all stay safe.”
Magnolia Bay Memories Page 36